Streaky Squads Set To Face Off In Tucson

Daniel Novinson

03/06/2009

The Bootleg's Daniel Novinson prepares the faithful with this look at Stanford's last regular season home game of the year versus the Arizona Wildcats at the McKale Center in Tucson. Check out the stats and facts, along with Daniel's pre-game prediction, before this matchup as Stanford looks to continue building momentum before heading into next week's Pac-10 Tournament in Los Angeles.

Stanford's season had been a tremendous disappointment heading into their
home finale, with the Cardinal eliminated from NCAA contention, save for an
11th-hour Pac-10 Tournament rally. Then, the Card down USC, 75-63, Mitch Johnson
kisses the logo at half-court, and Mitch, Kenny, Law, and Anthony leave Maples
champions.

Okay, the skeptic would say, a senior-laden Stanford was playing in its home
finale on Senior Day, USC is one of the conference's most inconsistent teams,
and the Cardinal tend to outperform expectations at home, Oregon State
excepted.

Then, Stanford went into Tempe as ten-point underdogs. They haven't won on
the road all season, ASU won at Maples by 30, with Pendergraph scoring 31.
Stanford hadn't signed any bigs in the intervening two months and so the Card
were rightfully ten-point underdogs. Then Stanford hands ASU its third straight
loss, 74-64, tallying the most points against the Sun Devils any school has had
since January. Oh, and Pendergraph was fouled a bajillion (yup, that's exact, I
counted) times to make him score from the free throw line, but Stanford, weak in
the paint all year, somehow equaled ASU's production. Go figure. The Sun Devils
play great defense and James Harden is in the conversation for league MVP – this
win isn't so easily explained away.

So maybe it's just fluky, or maybe it took awhile, but Stanford has finally
bought into/figured out Johnny Dawkins' system (and vice versa) and is gelling.
Cardinal fans aren't picky – the lean years have taught us to take a win any we
can get it – but what does Stanford's late-season rally portend for Arizona?

Who knows? We're back to where we started, and I'm left with the worst read
on this game as for any matchup I've previewed this season. The Wildcats are the
conference's flakiest team, while Stanford is the Pac-10's nine seed playing
like a three seed as of late. Stanford won the opener, while Arizona's at home,
has more on the line in terms of NCAA and Pac-10 Tournament seeding and is a
6.5-point favorite. The Wildcats' quality bigs – Jordan Hill and Chase Budinger
-- figure to exploit Stanford in the paint and on the boards, where the
post-Lopez Card have been weakest, but maybe Stanford's onto something new. I'm
still wiping the egg off my face from Thursday, and I'm fully aware that I could
be doing the same 24 hours from now.

Part IStanford 76, Arizona 60

Give the Cardinal credit for bouncing back smartly from its season-opening
loss, a 30-point shellacking at the hands of ASU, but Arizona really
self-destructed, demonstrating to the world what a team with no guard play looks
like. Arizona could have had Shaq and Wilt in his prime down low, but the Cats
wouldn't have won anyways, not with their guards leading the way to a 5-to-20
assist to turnover ratio and 0-of-8 shooting night from deep. Stanford launched
eight extra shots than the Wildcats, largely because of the +6 turnover margin,
and the Card's 8-of-22 three-point shooting isn't normally that good – except
when it's contrasted with 0-for-8. That's a 24-point swing for Stanford, and
that was plenty of margin for the Cardinal to grab their first league win.

Landry Fields led all scorers with 19 points on 7-of-8 shooting (including
2-of-2 deep), grabbed 12 rebounds, five of them offensive, and added three
steals for his best game, at least statistically, in a Stanford uniform.
Lawrence Hill added 14 points and Anthony Goods scored 13 for Stanford. For
Arizona, Jordan Hill was an absolute monster with 17 points and 16 rebounds,
guard Nic Wise added 17 points, and Chase Budinger poured in 12.

Scouting ArizonaJekyll, meet Hyde. The Wildcats'
Pac-10 season has played out as follows: win two, lose two, win two, lose three,
win six, lose four (and counting). I don't know if the Cats are trying to spell
out the Fibonacci sequence with their season results, but there's no mistaking
the streakiness – they're practically .500 in the league (8-9, 18-12 overall,
squarely on the bubble), but haven't gone win/loss/win or loss/win/loss the
entire Pac-10 season. Think the Cats are missing Lute Olsen a little?

Out of conference, the Cats lost to UAB, Texas A&M, and UNLV, all fringe
top-50 teams, but beat top-15 Kansas and Gonzaga. In the Pac-10, they swept the
Oregons, were swept by ASU and Cal, and, with a win today, will have split
against everyone else. (Considering all the chaos in the Wildcats' season
results, that's actually amazingly consistent with expectations.) They're
currently tied for fifth with USC and Washington State in the Pac-10 standings,
and with Oregon State a game behind, the game will have huge implications for
the Cats in the final Pac-10 standings.

The Wildcats are currently projected as an 11-seed, with about half the mock
brackets updated since the Cats' loss to Cal Thursday including Arizona and half
not: http://bracketproject.50webs.com/matrix.htm.
Hard to reside more squarely on the bubble than the Wildcats.

Statistically, the Cats are the inverse of the Card, with their perimeter
play lagging far behind that of their bigs. Hill (18 points, 11 rebounds, 55
percent overall shooting makes him the only Wildcat to make more than he misses)
and Budinger (18 points, seven rebounds, 42 percent deep) are the team's highest
scorers and forward Jamelle Horne (seven points) also starts. Nic Wise (15
points, 42 percent deep) torched Stanford last year and is a solid, if
undersized guard, but after Wise it's freshmen guards Kyle Fogg (six points) and
Garland Judkins (two points), along with sophomore guard Zane Johnson (five
points). Salim Stoudamire these guys are not, and Stanford needs to exploit
these matchups to counteract Arizona's edges on their home court and in the
paint.

PredictionI've learned my lesson. I'm sticking with the
chalk here, because truly, a 20-point swing in either direction wouldn't shock
me. Hey, at least we know when we don't have a clue.